


Praying

by YouMinLi



Series: We are Gods [2]
Category: Chinese Actor RPF, EXO (Band)
Genre: Gods, Prayer, Sea, War
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-29
Updated: 2019-12-29
Packaged: 2021-02-24 20:07:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,713
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22023715
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/YouMinLi/pseuds/YouMinLi
Summary: A mortal cannot hope to understand the wishes of a god. They can only hope that the god would be understanding, helpful in times of need along with their other burdens.
Series: We are Gods [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1585186
Kudos: 1





	Praying

**Author's Note:**

> So, here I am, like 6 months after the first fic. Oops.
> 
> This little fic is a bit of a teaser for the upcoming one, because I was suddenly struck by inspiration and needed to turn it into a fic. The next one that gets a bit deeper into this universe will hopefully be coming soon, but looking at it again, there's still a lot I need to sort out. 
> 
> Please look forwards to it!

Little feet, running across a sand swept road, to a door open. No one tells him to go, and it is so boring on the beach. This house will be warm, the nice older sister who lives here never minds when he visits.

Nice older sister is not here today, perhaps in the faraway mountains where she says she really lives. A priest, that’s what she called herself, coming only to help and to visit.

But the door is still open, and the winds are too cold, almost pushing, so why bother with the outside stinging when he can go inside, nice and warm? Nice older sister would never mind.

There is a parchment lying on the ground, unfurled, messy red words on the page. Nice sister had shown him her penmanship, and it was never this messy before. But he plops himself down onto the ground anyways, nice sister always write fun stories about the gods, even if no one else lets him read it besides her. Slowly, as he is just learning his words, he reads. 

“ When praying to the gods, pray first to Do. He is the creator, the tender, and he is justly merciful, and if the gods would listen, he will first.

If Do does not listen, pray next to Lay. The healer, the caregiver, he knows the ends to every illness and the cure for any disease, but his knowledge is only for the worthy and those who are good. He may judge harshly, but in dire danger, he may help who he thinks fitting.

Suho holds life in his hands, water, which gives life as it runs, watching how everything lives and grows in a circle of life, death and balance all twisted and tilted together. He will not usually judge one to be more than the other, but maybe, just maybe, he will think you good enough to help.

The entwined sky gods Kai and Shixun, everchanging and flowing, seeing all and feeling more, are unsteady but may be your next hope. Pray that they are in a good and giving mood, these entwined gods of sky and love, and perhaps if you are favoured, one may help.

May you never have to think about this, but pray next to Loey. The god of fire is of warmth and happiness, and he gives blessings easily, but turns the other way in cases of deserved need. Humans have stolen his warmth too many times for him to offer it easily, and the heat he offers is almost superficial. When you pray to him, you pray to a wounded god, though he may be whole, and those who he would finally look to help are those who have been pained.

Only in the case of a final resort do you pray to Lu, God of animals, and turner of time. Stripped bare, humans are still animals, and it is this pity you throw yourself onto the blade of.

Xiumin and Chen rule over opposing times, one cold and one warmth. Pray only to Chen during summer, and only to Xiumin in winter, for other times they will never answer. Be warned that Chen is more merciful, though his definition of quick mercy may be not be the desired prayer.

Never pray to Kris nor Byun for help. 

Byun holds light, brilliant and shining yet holding no warmth, here or in the shadows. He will take one look and decide that life is to continue to run as it wishes. Only warmth will sway him, and he is no fire, not anything that can be warmed by the hold of a human.

Kris, Dragon Emperor, holds the world in his grasp, though his express kingdom is of the sea. He holds court where no one else dares to go, and his subjects are creatures that are neither god nor mortal. He will not weep nor spare a second glance for a human, and wasting your last breath on useless prayers are a luxury that you should not indulge in. 

Gods still have their preferences, and in the end, you should pray to all of them for help. For the just in cases. For the possibility that one of them will save you for nothing but a whim.

If you are in trouble and in desperate need of help, pray in this order. But remember, the gods do not necessarily answer. “

The words do not make complete sense, but before he can reread it again like mom taught him to so words can be clearer, she arrives! Mom is flushed, probably from the cold, and before he knows it, he’s gone, taken out of nice older sister’s house and brought back into the cold, mom walking as fast as if there was someone chasing them out of the house. Her arms are warm and her face is calming, and before they get back to their house, Zitao is asleep in happiness.

~~~

When the wave rushes up once more, threatening to finally push him down, Zitao is tired. His limbs all ache from a day of practicing, and the water which had raised him is violent, beating and throwing and trying to kill him. Zitao does not have much experience in it, but he thinks he is drowning.

As the shine of the moon gets blurred and removed with each toss of water into his eyes, the story he read from the nice older sister’s page long again somehow rise up to the top of his mind again. But he’s too much older now, and when he thinks again, it is not a story, but an instruction list, a desperate last plea.

The older sister was thrown out of her temple, and when he heard his parents talk about it late at night, they said she was dead, somehow having displeased the gods. The note was her last desperate attempt at reaching the gods, her one last service.

The water rushes up Zitao’s nose, and he coughs, desperate. He has choked on water several times, flailing against the water trying to survive but not before like this, all alone in the middle of the sea. 

Zitao’s head momentarily goes under and it’s an even harder battle fighting to pull it up, and Zitao knows he is drowning. 

“ _ Pray first to Do. _ ” And he does.

“ _ Pray next to Lay. _ ” And he does, just as another wave rushes at his head. He goes under, and has to push his head out of the water, throwing it back as he gasps for air.

Instead of feeling air rush through his lungs, cold and saving, there goes the sharp spike of pain, echoing through his head from the back all the way to the front, and Zitao’s limbs still as he focuses on this new shock. 

His dad had told him to never hit his head, that there are too many important things inside it that he would be horribly hurt if he did. Zitao knows it now, as he reaches back to touch the wound, forgetting the water.

Zitao can’t move, what he sees going hazy, the water batting at him still, and his head hurts so so much.

Who was next on the list? Suho. And as the water rushes to embrace Zitao like it always did, Zitao prays to Suho and does not think about dying.

~~~

What an irony. Zitao could almost laugh as he lies on the earth, bloodied and bruised in this mess of mud and gore on the battlefield. If he turns his attention away from the smell and towards the dark stormy sky, he can almost pretend that it was the night so long ago where everything changed, and that he would be drowning in familiar waters instead of this lonely and harsh battlefield. 

There are bodies lying all around next to him. Some because of him, some perhaps also hovering on the cusp of life and death like he, and some perhaps once his friends. 

There’s too much rain for anything to properly happen. It steeps through the crack in his helmet and attempts to wipe away the dust and blood on his face, but it’s not enough. Rain, water, he misses his father, all of them. The mortal one who loved him, and the two gods who took him in.

The prayer list worked, but now it does not apply to Zitao at all. Like it said, gods have their priorities, and perhaps Kris and Suho have him on theirs. 

People, at least the ones he sees, run all in one direction, no matter friend or foe or whoever, and Zitao cranes his head with as much effort as he can exert to see a mudslide, the mudslide everyone knew would come down onto this valley, but were still forced to fight in. Oh, if only it didn’t rain.

Zitao knows he’s dying, and if not first by the wound that has pierced him through, then by suffocation from the mudslide that is going to wash him over, because he certainly cannot get up and run like everyone else. It’s a strange thing to think, of death, but it’s not the first time he’s stared at it. No, the first time was drowning in the sea and being saved by a god, and the other times were all dying on other battlefields, saved by people who saw that he was alive and always rushed him to the medical tent where a god healed him.

Zitao rearranges his head so that he can stare up at the grey sky pouring down upon them again, and wonders if he should die or pray. Dad would be here in an instance to save him if he did, or maybe even papa, ride out on a carriage from the sea and terrify the entire army into no longer fighting and put Zitao out of a job. That’ll be fun to watch.

No, perhaps he should just die. He can’t keep outrunning death, and while his parents are gods, he is still very much mortal.

But still, he thinks about the prayer list before he drifts off. How did the nice older sister die? Which god did she finish praying to, or had all of them forsaken her? 

“ _ Pray to…” _

**Author's Note:**

> I love comments and replying to them, so please comment!


End file.
